And I'm sure Bryce was in favor of whatever position gets him to the majors faster

Yeah. Staying at Catcher=1) Longer timeline to the majors2) More involved development for the position3) Fewer at bats per season4) Greater injury risk and physical breakdown5) More days off

Even if Bryce developed into a top-notch, big league catcher, it's his offensive potential that they wanted to maximize. So getting his bat into the lineup sooner than later and having him be an everyday player were the drivers in the decision to switch positions.

Yeah. Staying at Catcher=1) Longer timeline to the majors2) More involved development for the position3) Fewer at bats per season4) Greater injury risk and physical breakdown5) More days off

Even if Bryce developed into a top-notch, big league catcher, it's his offensive potential that they wanted to maximize. So getting his bat into the lineup sooner than later and having him be an everyday player were the drivers in the decision to switch positions.

1 and 2. The kid was already a good defensive catcher and he would probably develop into a world-class defensive catcher had they kept him there.3. Greatly improved prodution from that position4. Who cares? He'll be a Yankee in seven years5. A kid like that can still play 130-140 and be o.k.

And it's not like his offense is world-beating right now. We should have kept him at C and let the Yankees deal with his injuries and break-down.

When has so much...etc? I think this even beats the time, about January, 1972, when Richard Nixon outlined a play for George Allen and told Old George to run it. The Redskins did run it in their playoff game against the '49ers...first Washington post-season game in my lifetime. The play failed, and the Redskins lost, although I forget what the play was supposed to do.

Richard Nixon outlined a play for George Allen and told Old George to run it. The Redskins did run it in their playoff game against the '49ers...first Washington post-season game in my lifetime. The play failed, and the Redskins lost, although I forget what the play was supposed to do.

As I recall the story, Allen thanked Nixon for the play and told him he'd run it, then when Nixon was out of sight promptly crumpled it up and threw it in the trash.

As I recall the story, Allen thanked Nixon for the play and told him he'd run it, then when Nixon was out of sight promptly crumpled it up and threw it in the trash.

I remember it as some goofy fake field-goal that was supposed to be a pass to the wide receiver who replaced Charley Taylor, who had broken a leg against the KC Chiefs. Clifton McNiel? True, though...any trick play would have been against Allen's nature...letting Sonny pass was against Allen's nature...in fact, doing anything on offense more creative than handing the ball to Larry Brown was against Allen's nature.

Interesting to compare how the Nats handled Strasburg to how the Braves handled Medlen. Both had TJ at the same time and pitched a little at the end of last year. The braves decided to pitch him out of the bullpen at the beginning of the year. They are both on roughly the same innings limit.

“We knew coming out of spring training he probably had 150-160 innings, based on our organizational belief in percentage of increase in innings per year,” said Braves general manager Frank Wren, indicating it’s about 20 percent. “So we preferred to start him off in the bullpen where he could be a bridge for our starters for the first two months and then after that we would evaluate our needs, and it would allow us to have him until the end once we put him in the rotation.”

Interesting to compare how the Nats handled Strasburg to how the Braves handled Medlen. Both had TJ at the same time and pitched a little at the end of last year. The braves decided to pitch him out of the bullpen at the beginning of the year. They are both on roughly the same innings limit.

For Strasburg and the Nats, the situation is much different considering the money and expectations involved. Medlen was not a former number one pick and at this point isn't expected to someday be one of the best pitchers in baseball. The Braves also already lost their ace pitcher this season when Brandon Beachy underwent Tommy John back in June.

The Nationals wanted Strasburg to begin this season like any normal starter would, with a full spring training and starts every fifth day. They had no intention of putting him in the bullpen and likely never considered it.

While I am in favor of pulling him from the rotation now that he has hit his innings limit, I think it wrong to say that there was only one way to manage those innings. I don't think I ever favored a stone cold shut down and a restart, but more use of Lannan / Gorz / Stammen as spot starters (6 starts in the year instead of 2 to this point), a 6 man rotation when they were playing with CMW, or a stretch of short starts could have given 2 -3 start late in the year. I probably have some of that posted at the start of this thread or in an early season rotation thread.

They also may not have expected to seriously be in the playoff hunt. The Braves had every reason to expect to be in the hunt.

My concern with using Strasburg out of the pen is that he would likely go max-max effort every single pitch. Heading into this year they wanted to ramp him down so he wasn't going high effort so consistently.

It's an interesting comparison, though, and I don't have much of a problem with what the Braves did with Medlen. The Braves organization generally takes good care of their arms.

Did they expect Medlen to be as good as he's been? To me, that seems compelling - it's easy to start someone in the bullpen if you think he's a fringy starter anyway - like they had talked about doing with Det. Everything with Stras is magnified because he's basically the anointed "Future Best Starter in Baseball." But maybe they did expect Medlen to be as good as he's been - I don't know the Braves' system very well.

But don't you think Mike Rizzo & Davy Johnsom are smart enough they would have done that if it was the best course of action ? There must be something to keeping Strasburg in a constant rotation during the year that went along with the innings limit.

But don't you think Mike Rizzo & Davy Johnsom are smart enough they would have done that if it was the best course of action ? There must be something to keeping Strasburg in a constant rotation during the year that went along with the innings limit.

or they never expected the team to be in contention so they didn't bother looking for a creative solution

by Ben Lindbergh....But despite the similarities—the surgery, the recovery timeline, the innings limit—Strasburg and Medlen aren’t much alike. Strasburg is the former best pitching prospect ever, a prodigy who pitched like an ace from his first start on. Medlen is a former 10th-round pick with a mid-rotation ceiling. Medlen had major-league experience in relief, while Strasburg has never pitched out of the pen as a pro. Converting from the rotation to the bullpen and back isn’t without its risks, both physical and psychological, and while plenty of promising pitchers have debuted in the bullpen before snagging a rotation spot, few have gone back again after establishing themselves as starters. Those risks were much lower in Medlen’s case, both because he’s a less valuable arm and because he’s 2 ½ years older, which puts him out of the injury nexus.

There’s another factor to consider here: the Braves were expected to contend, while the Nationals weren’t. The BP staff picked the Nats to finish fourth in the East, without a single first-place vote. An early end to the season for Strasburg wouldn’t be a big issue if the Nats were well out of the race. When Jordan Zimmermann was shut down in late August of last year, Washington was over 20 games out in the East, and no one said a word. The Nats’ success probably shouldn’t have been as surprising to them as it was to outside observers, but expecting the NL’s best record would have been unrealistic. Something else to keep in mind: the Nats are ahead in the East by only four games. If the Braves finish strong, those extra regular-season innings from Strasburg might make the difference between a Wild Card spot and a guaranteed trip to the NLDS. And the gain in championship expectancy from avoiding a play-in game could be greater than the gain from starting Strasburg over Detwiler a few times in October.....

ConclusionWe have already discussed how the first of the three physiological elements of injury risk--the intrinsic strain that the pitching motion requires--is of greatest concern for very young pitchers. Indeed, based on a limited sample of MLB injury data reviewed by Under the Knife, pitchers under the age of 24 are especially likely to experience injuries to their elbows and shoulders, those body parts that are put under the greatest stress by the pitching motion. However, it may be more proper to associate the pitching motion itself with the underlying risk of injury observed among pitchers of all ages.

The relationship between age and fatigue is more ambiguous. Our attrition rate study focused only on performance in the most recent season, rather than fatigue accumulated over the course of the career. However, from what specific data we do have available, it appears that fatigue-based injuries are more likely to afflict older pitchers. According to MLB data, while the risk of tears and fractures decreases with age, the risk of strain and inflammation increases. So too does the risk of injury to body parts that are secondary to a pitcher's motion, such as his back, knee, and hamstrings. Fatigue-based injuries such as these may account for the gradual slope upward in injury risk after the age of 25.

It is the final factor--mechanics--that may be responsible for the high incidence of injuries among very young pitchers. It is likely that pitchers with inherently poor mechanics are weeded out very early in their careers. Our attrition rate data suggest that injury risk is very high even for 21- and 22- year-olds who have pitched successfully in the major leagues. One can imagine that it is higher still for pitchers who have not yet turned professional, and for pitchers whose mechanics are sufficiently poor that they do not develop the command necessary to reach the major leagues at all.

There is no ready statistical metric to evaluate a pitcher's mechanics, and even case-by-case observation can obscure the physiology unique to each pitcher. Thus, the most powerful measure of the efficiency of a pitcher's motion may simply be the passage of time without his encountering serious injury. The so-called injury nexus does appear to be a real phenomenon, but it occurs before the age of 23, a younger age than some previous studies have suggested.